Post on 10-May-2022
Felix Banda (2018) Translanguaging and English-African language mother tongues as linguistic dispensation in
teaching and learning in a black township school in Cape Town, Current Issues in Language Planning, 19:2, 198-217,
DOI: 10.1080/14664208.2017.1353333
University of the Western Cape Research Repository fbanda@uwc.ac.za
Translanguaging and English-African language mother tongues as
linguistic dispensation in teaching and learning in a black township
school in Cape Town
Felix Banda
Department of Linguistics, University of the Western Cape, Bellville, Republic of South Africa
Abstract
Drawing on the notion of translanguaging, I show how learners in a Black township
secondary school in Cape Town use their multilingual repertoire to achieve power, agency
and voice. I use the conceptualisation of the prototypical pedagogical macrogenre from
systemic functional linguistics to show how translanguaging can be used strategically to
actualise regulative and instructional registers to engender teaching and learning in
multilingual contexts, and to illustrate that the often-assumed “chaos” in translanguaged
discourse can be harnessed to engender pedagogic discourse. I demonstrate that by using the
extended linguistic repertoire, learners do not need to be competent in monoglot English to
be involved in classroom interactions and learning, as the Xhosa-English translanguaged
discourses provide the co(n)texts on which the “standard” English texts are consumed and
produced. The article concludes with a thesis for language education policy that puts
translanguaging at the centre of classroom practice in multilingual South Africa: it provides a
new avenue for postcolonial learning/teaching, as it frames the learners’ cognition of content
and ability to construct meaningful texts in familiar cultural and sociolinguistic contexts.
Keywords: translanguaging; multilingualism; policy; register; African mother tongues
Introduction
This article explores multilingual pedagogic discourse practices in a Black school in Cape
Town, South Africa. The other school types in South Africa are referred to as former Whites
only, former Coloured and former Indian schools. The specific focus is on how multilingual
learners use their linguistic repertoires to engage in academic tasks to achieve academic
excellence. Of particular interest is the teaching and learning of English content through an
African language and/or an African language-English translingual amalgamated linguistic
dispensation. I conceive English and African language mother tongues as constituting a
multidimensional linguistic continuum, rather than as differentiated and autonomous
systems.
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In the article, I contend that language education policy and practice in South Africa
need to consider translanguaging as a legitimate interactional practice in classroom
discourse in schools. This would take advantage of the multilingual language practices of
learners and teachers alike. This is particularly the case with Black learners who find that
they cannot always use their extended linguistic repertoire for academic purpose owing to
the monolingual orientation in language education policy. Specifically, I use classroom
practice data to show how a teacher and learners at a Black school in Cape Town, South
Africa, used translanguaging as a strategy to transcend conceptual and linguistic constraints
in an English language class. In exploring the benefits of the multilingual linguistic practices,
I use Christie’s (1997, 2001, 2002, 2005) conceptualisation of the prototypical pedagogical
macrogenre (Curriculum Initiation^Curriculum Collaboration^Curriculum Closure) to show
how translanguaging can be used strategically to actualise regulative and instructional
registers to engender teaching and learning in multilingual contexts. The regulative register
refers to language choices designed to establish goals for teaching–learning activities, and to
foster and maintain the direction of the activities until their achievement; while the
instructional register refers to language choices related to actual content, that is, the
knowledge and realisation of associated skills being taught (Christie, 2001, 2002, 2005). It is
possible to use Xhosa or Xhosa-English to regulate and predispose the learners and English
(or English-Xhosa) for instructional purposes. I maintain that the notion of pedagogic
macrogenres with contrastive regulative and instructional registers playing a critical role
offers an avenue in which the often-assumed “chaos” in translanguage (multilingual)
discourse can strategically be exploited to engender pedagogic discourse. The concept of
pedagogic discourse is borrowed from Bernstein’s sociolinguistic theoretical framework
(1990, 1996, 2000) and genre theory in the Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) tradition
(Christie, 2001, 2002; Christie & Martin, 1997; Halliday, 1994; Martin, 1992). The concept is
useful in that it enables the study of the patterns of language use in classrooms as a form of
“pedagogic discourse.”
Conceptualising multilingualism and the monolingual ideology in South
Africa
At a time when in Africa people necessarily speak at least two languages (an African language
and a colonial language) as a necessity, arguments for a singular “mother tongue” education
are out of place. Yet, the literature is awash with repeated arguments about the benefit of
“mother tongue” only education in South Africa and Africa generally (see, for overviews,
Banda, 2009, 2010; De Klerk, 1996, 2000). In South Africa, the mother tongue in the
singular is seen as the panacea for poor education in Black townships in particular. In reality,
however, language choice is one of the many problems besieging education delivery in
former non-white schools. These include lack of teaching material, overcrowding,
gangsterism, union involvement [unions refuse any suggestions of revamping the education
system after years of apartheid neglect], the inherited apartheid legacy of poor school
management and the apartheid architecture of infrastructure in which Black schools are
often found at the fringes of modern society, with some still lacking computers and libraries
(Banda, 2004). The 1953 UNESCO declaration that the mother tongue should be the
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mainstay of education was commendable at the time. It was believed people lived in self-
contained communities speaking one language – the mother tongue. People were thought to
have a singular identity, which was directly linked to the mother tongue. A loss of the mother
tongue was thought to mean a loss of a people’s culture and identity. On the basis of this,
mother tongue education was linked to human rights (Skutnabb-Kangas, 2000), while the
rise of English as a global language of education has been likened to linguistic imperialism
(Phillipson, 2009).
However, even before Europeans came to Africa, the nature of African society in
which people moved from one area to another in pursuit of new land for farming, grazing for
cattle, trade and also due to wars of conquest means that language contact and
multilingualism are not entirely new to the continent. The European (and Arab) influences
only added different (colonial and religious) dimensions to the linguistic situation in Africa
(Banda, 2016, 2009). The click sound in the first syllable in Xhosa [amaXhosa refers to
people; isiXhosa refers to the language. I use Xhosa without the prefix to refer to the
language speakers throughout as is the convention in English] and a vast amount of click
sounds found in a number of Bantu languages are indicative of the language contact between
the Bantu people and the Khoisan people. Thus, the linguistic phenomenon of
multilingualism predates the arrival of Europeans and Arabs into Africa.
The European and Arab sojourns and subsequent urbanisation in Africa only helped
to accelerate multilingualism and linguistic diversity whose roots were already in place.
Brock-Utne (2009), Banda (2009, 2010) and Mc Laughlin (2009) have argued that most
Africans acquire first, second, third, etc., languages at the same time. As Banda (2010) notes,
they do not often distinguish them as first, second, third, etc., languages because they grow
up learning and speaking them as an integrated linguistic repertoire. Second, from an
African perspective, and the increasingly urbanising Africa contexts in which languages are
mostly acquired at the same time in non-formal circumstances and not consecutively, the
idea of first, second, third, etc., languages is alien and does not make sociolinguistic sense.
Although on paper there appears to be increasing recognition about the need to
nurture and promote multilingualism in Africa, such sentiments are often based on a
monoglot/monolingual understanding of multilingualism. Multilingualism is seen as a case
of multiple monolingualisms (Banda, 2009, 2010; Blackledge & Creese, 2010; García, 2009,
2014; García & Wei, 2014). In this monoglossic conceptualisation, being multilingual is seen
as incremental in the case of “adding” languages or “subtracting” languages (see Banda,
2009, 2010).
In this regard, some literature in South Africa has proposed what is called mother
tongue-based multilingual education (see Alexander, 2005 for some studies). The model has
been taken up and has been proposed for the Philippines. Focusing on Asia, the Philippines
in particular, Malone (2007, p. 1) notes that mother-based multilingual education (MT-based
MLE) is defined in two ways: (1) “the use of students’ mother tongue and two or more
additional languages as Languages of Instruction (LoI) in school”; and (2) “to describe
bilingual education across multiple language communities – each community using their
own mother tongue plus the official school language for instruction.” In both scenarios, the
languages involved are separated and used in parallel or dual/multiple medium streams,
rather than as a singular linguistic repertoire. Similarly, notions such as mother tongue
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multilingualism as used by for example Mohanty (2009, 2007) are useful in as far as there is
recognition that children may speak two or more languages as mother tongues. However, the
models are transitional in that they are premised on initial learning/ teaching in a mother
tongue before transitioning to a regional language or former colonial language (usually
English, French or Portuguese).
In South Africa, additive bilingualism is premised on 6–7 years of primary education
in the mother tongue before switching to English or Afrikaans as the sole language of
education.
The African mother tongue is discarded altogether or becomes an (optional) additional
(language) subject. In terms of classroom practice, this effectively means monolingual/
monoglot mother tongue practices being replaced by monolingual/monoglot English
practices (Banda, 2009, 2010). I conceptualise bi/muiltilingual education as one in which
two or more languages are used to teach content such as science, geography and
mathematics, and not merely as other language subjects (cf. Baetens-Beardsmore, 1992;
Banda, 2010).
Similarly, although multilingualism is recognised in the South African constitution
through the Bill of Rights (South African Constitution Act No. 108, 1996), the notion is
perceived as recognising 11 autonomous languages as official. Other than English (and to
some extent Afrikaans), which enjoy national prestige, African languages such as Xhosa,
Tswana and Zulu are mostly confined to certain regions. The promotion of multilingualism is
thus at best the promotion of regional or province-based multiple monolingualisms (Banda,
2009, 2010). The Provincial Western Cape Government (1997) institutions and the Western
Cape Education Department (WCED, 2007) under which the school in which the article is
based have adopted additive bilingualism as the governing language education policy.
The monolingual ideology is evident in the WCED (2007) language education policy
document on what it calls mother tongue-based bilingual education: “the mother tongue is
used for learning and an additional language is gradually added and strengthened to the
point where it could be the LOLT after a period of say 6 years” (WCED, 2007, p. 4). Similarly,
the South African language in education policy (1997) advocates the development and
promotion of additive bilingualism through the home language of learners. Clearly, the
assumption is that the learners have one language in the home and the other languages are
seen as separate but which can be “added.” This helps to normalise both the monolingual
ideology and a bounded notion of language.
Translanguaging as linguistic dispensation in classroom practice
Following recent conceptualisation of language as a social practice, in which languages are
not seen as countable and autonomous systems (Heller, 2007; Makoni & Pennycook, 2007;
Pennycook, 2010), and particularly translanguaging as pedagogic discourse (García, 2009,
2014; García & Wei, 2014; Williams, 1994), I defer to “translanguaging” rather than
“codeswitching.” First, translanguaging has been theorised as “the purposeful pedagogical
alternation of languages in spoken and written, receptive and productive modes”
(Hornberger & Link, 2012, p. 262). The purposive nature of the practice means teachers and
learners use their extended linguistic repertoire as normal classroom practice free of
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retributions. Second, I see translanguaging as a novel approach quite different from the
monolingual/monoglot-biased code-switching. In this regard, it is informative as Hornberger
and Link (2012, p. 263) state that code-switching “tended to focus on issues of language
interference, transfer or borrowing;” while (García, 2009, p. 51) adds, “translanguaging
‘shifts the lens from cross-linguistic influence’ to how multilinguals ‘intermingle linguistic
features that have hereto been administratively or linguistically assigned to a particular
language or language variety.’” Third, the work of García (2009, 2014), García and Wei
(2014) and Canagarajah (2001), in particular, on Tamil-English bilingual learners has shown
how learners transcend the limitations imposed by the Tamil only and English only ideology
through strategic translanguaging. Canagarajah (2001, p. 210) concludes the learners were
able to gain “sufficient agency…[to enable] them resist policies that contribute to symbolic
domination.” This study is therefore a contribution that showcases how translanguaging
enables learners in a school in South Africa resist symbolic domination by English
monoglot/monolingual norms. It also shows how translanguaging provides a novel way in
which multilingual learners can achieve voice, power and agency in classroom practices
designed to bridge home- and school-based literacy practices.
Sociolinguistic context of study area
Data for this article were obtained from an on-going larger project on multilingual literacy
practices in Black and Coloured schools in Cape Town. Six research assistants collected data
from 8 Black township schools (4 Primary and 4 Secondary schools), and 8 coloured schools
(4 Primary and 4 Secondary schools) on the Cape Flats, in Cape Town. The data have yielded
large amounts of observation notes, audio and video recordings of classroom practices and
interviews with teachers and learners. Focus for this particular article is on multilingual
classroom practices in a Grade 10 English language class in one of the many secondary
schools in Khayelitsha, a Black township on the Cape Flats in the Western Cape Province,
South Africa. I am calling it a “Black” township to distinguish it from areas designated for
“White” and “Coloured” (mixed race) people respectively during apartheid. The
demographics of these areas have not changed much in post-apartheid era. Townships such
as Mitchell’s Plain and Grassy Park are still predominantly Coloured areas, while
Khayelitsha, Langa, Gugulethu and Philippi (to name a few) are predominantly Black areas.
Khayelitsha is the second largest Black township in South Africa after Soweto in
Johannesburg, and the largest in Cape Town. It is the fastest growing township in South
Africa with people coming mainly from the Eastern Cape Province, and also from other
provinces and countries. The latest census statistics indicate that 90.54% of people in
Khayelitsha claimed Xhosa as their first language followed by English 3.22%, and the rest is
made up of “Other,” Afrikaans, Sesotho, Zulu and other South African official languages.
Demographically, more than 98% are classified as Black (African), while Coloured, White,
Indian and “Other” make up the rest (Statistics South Africa [Stats SA], 2011). The idea to
build Khayelitsha was mooted by Piet Koornhof in 1983, the apartheid era Minister of Co-
operation and Development. The area known then as Site C became established as
Khayelitsha by 1985. It initially had about 30,000 inhabitants. As of 2011, the population of
Khayelitsha had grown to 391,749, with the following demography: 90.5% Black African,
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8.5% Coloured and 0.5% White (Stats SA, 2011). Since census data only indicate what people
responded to the question of what their first language was, it does not capture the extent of
multilingualism in the study area.
In determining the extent of monolingualism or multilingualism in Black Townships,
one also needs to consider that although there are some programmes on radio and television
in Xhosa, English programmes dominate media so that the majority of programmes children
listen to on the radio or watch on TV are in English. At the same time, although exposure to
English does not necessarily translate into proficiency in the language, the argument remains
that children and adults are exposed to English in urban townships 202 F. BANDA such as
the one under study. When census statistics, or educators say that Black children do not
speak English at home or that they have difficulties comprehending English lessons, it
should not necessarily be taken to mean that the communities they come from or that these
children are completely monolingual. Thanks to the colonial and apartheid legacy, adults are
exposed to English (and some extent Afrikaans), the language(s) of the workplace and
socioeconomic mobility. In any case, the learners of the school used in this study have had at
least 10 years of formal education in English. The learners used in this study can therefore be
characterised as at the very least bilingual (Xhosa and English), but some are multilingual as
they take Afrikaans as a subject. Moreover, they either speak or do understand related Nguni
family languages such as Zulu or Ndebele, to which Xhosa belongs.
In terms of the sociolinguistic situation in South Africa and Black communities such
as Khayelitsha, a cursory look might suggest language shift to English (Anthonissen, 2009;
Kamwangamalu, 2003; McCormick, 2002). However, what seems to be the case is that
language contact and the advent of English as a language of global mobility, language
practices have changed so that at home and in different domains, people readily deploy two
or more languages at once in various combinations for their meaning potentials (Banda,
2010, 2009; McCormick, 2002; Paxton, 2009; Stroud & Kerfoot, 2013). The sociolinguistic
situation is therefore better described as depicting a multilingual situation rather than a case
of language shift. Bits-and-pieces or entire chunks of African languages are not entirely lost
as they are dispersed and dispensed in various combinations with English (and Afrikaans)
across space and time. Stroud and Kerfoot (2013) note that some scholars (Banda, 2010;
McCormick, 2002; Paxton, 2009) have argued that multilingual linguistic dispensation has
become a language practice in homes in South Africa, and Cape Town in particular.
It is not surprising that there is growing literature in South Africa championing
translanguaging as pedagogical discourse to engender and unlock the knowledge embedded
in learners’ multilingual repertoire (see Antia, 2015; Banda, 2010; Makalela, 2015a, 2015b;
Mwinda & Van der Walt, 2015). Drawing from these studies, I shall assume that multilingual
learners have an extended language repertoire drawn from their lived experiences. In turn, I
assume that the learners draw on this language repertoire “to take control of their own
learning, to self-regulate when and how to language, depending on the context in which they
are being asked to perform” (García & Wei, 2014, p. 80). The flexibility in languaging
practices as will be shown in this study enables the learners and teachers to demonstrate
creativity and agency, which would be impossible to achieve in monolingual education
contexts.
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Indeed, regarding classroom discourse, some studies have shown the beneficial effects
of multilingual linguistic practices in classrooms in South Africa. For instance, in South
Africa, multilingual language practices have been shown to be beneficial for primary and
secondary school teaching and learning of mathematics (Setati, 1998); science and English
(Setati & Adler, 2000; Setati, Adler, Reed, & Bapoo, 2002) and Economics and Biology
(Banda, 2010; Paxton, 2009). In other words, although the data from this article are based
on one class, the translanguaging practices are common in multilingual South African
schools, as is also seen in Setati and Adler (2000), Setati et al. (2002), Banda (2010), Stroud
and Kerfoot (2013), Makalela (2015a, 2015b), Mwinda and Van der Walt (2015) and Antia
(2015), to name a few studies.
The data used in this article were obtained through audio recording, observation,
notes and interviews with the principal of the school and the teacher who taught the class
involved in the study. Translations and transcriptions of audio recordings were done by a
team of six research assistants, who themselves grew up and went to school in the Black
townships and are familiar with Xhosa and other languages spoken in the area. The accuracy
of the translations was double-checked by a linguistics lecturer and a postgraduate student,
both of whom speak Xhosa and English and were not originally involved in the planning,
execution and initial translations of the recordings. The teacher and all the learners in the
class studied claimed to be from a Xhosa speaking background.
Translanguaging and pedagogical discourse analysis
Martin (1992) defines genre as a staged, goal-oriented, purposeful activity in which speakers
engage members of a particular culture. Based on this [SFL] formulation of genre, Christie
(1997, 2001, 2002, 2005) proposes a model of classroom discourse analysis, which views
classroom episodes as “curriculum genres,” some of which operate in turn as part of larger
units called curriculum macrogenres. In illustrating how translanguaging operates
differently from monolingual education, I draw on Christie’s (1997, 2001, 2002, 2005)
pedagogical macrogenres in which regulative and instructional registers are instantiated. The
first order or regulative register refers to sets of language choices which are principally
involved in establishing goals for teaching–learning activities, and with fostering and
maintaining the direction of the activities until their achievement; while the second order or
instructional register refers to language choices in which the knowledge and associated skills
being taught are realised (Christie, 1997). Thus, from Martin’s (1992) definition of genre,
pedagogical macrogenres refer to the staged unravelling of classroom interaction. Christie
(1997, 2001, 2002, 2005) describes the stages as Curriculum Instantiation^ Curriculum
Collaboration^ Curriculum Closure. The ^ symbol represents a typical move in genre/text
analysis (Eggins & Slade, 1997). This model is similar to Sinclair and Coulthard’s (1975,
1992) three move model of classroom interaction involving the Initiation^Response^Follow-
up structure). In essence, both models have three moves: “beginning, middle, end.” The
unfolding moves are reflected through various shifts in language use. I use Christie’s model
as it allows for study of classroom interaction and patterns of language use in classrooms as a
form of pedagogic discourse in which two registers are in operation. Moreover, the model
allows for analysis of the unfolding moves as reflecting various shifts in language use. In this
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study, it allows me to analyse the use of multiple languages and blended linguistic elements
in the unfolding stages in pedagogic discourse. Therefore, although the model was originally
conceived in English monoglot classroom practices, I use it to highlight strategic use of
(forms of) multiple languages as pedagogical discourse across the macrogenres and registers
in multilingual classroom contexts.
Translanguaging as transformative pedagogic discourse
The very idea that “mixing” languages helps learners with learning and acquiring new
knowledge might not sit well with traditional pedagogical practices which are premised on
using a singular language at a time and space for teaching and learning. At the same time, it
is clear from the classroom practices of the school understudy that in terms of what
Bernstein (1990, 1996, 2000) calls pedagogic discourse, that the delivery of the prototypical
pedagogical macrogenre was accomplished through translanguaging. The classroom practice
below clearly articulates Christie’s “overall pattern of prototypical model of a curriculum
macrogenre” as in “Curriculum Initiation^ Curriculum Collaboration^ Curriculum Closure”
(Christie, 2002, p. 100). In this overall pattern, “Curriculum Initiation” represents the
opening genre, which establishes goals, and crucially predisposes the learners to work and
think in particular ways. The middle genre elaborates on the work necessary towards
achievement of the tasks. The Curriculum Closure represents the final genre, in which the
task is completed. These stages as illustrated in this article may overlap and are done in more
than one language to take advantage of learners’ multilingual linguistic dispositions.
Classroom context: Grade 10 English class
Observation notes
The female teacher said she is in her 30s, has a bachelor’s degree to teach English and
has been a teacher for more than 10 years. She resides in Khayelitsha township. She
says she speaks Xhosa, sometimes English or Xhosa-English “mix” at home and at
school with learners and colleagues. The class has 35 learners (23 females and 12
males) ranging between 17 and 20 years in age, and they all claim to speak mostly
Xhosa at home and also English or Xhosa-English “mix” with peers.
In terms of pedagogic discourse (Bernstein, 1990, 1996, 2000) and pedagogical
macrogenre (Christie, 2002), turns 1–6 illustrate Curriculum Initiation being dominated by
regulative register in which the goals of the lesson are outlined. Learners’ discourse is almost
entirely in Xhosa, while the teacher mostly uses English and she adopts a conversational tone
with the solidarity “we” construction in her discourse. The “we” construction functions to
reduce social distance and reduce power differences between the teacher and the learners.
T1 L1 (Group 1): Hayi soyenza njani? [No how are we going to do it?]
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T2 T: Ok even if you don’t write down the whole story, the person comfortable has to
share the story with the speaker and the speaker will stand up and share it with class
in English.
T3 L2 (Group 6): Ndizobalisa ngesiya sethu sobayi two. [I am going to share this one with
the two of us?].
T4 T: Ayi, [No,] with your group first. It seems as if leaders are not taking leadership, not
exercising what must be done, if the leader doesn’t know, then you should ask me. If
you want me to…
T5 L2: [To teacher] Hayi mani susifakela i-story. Esingasifuniyo. [No don’t narrate the
story. We don’t want.] We know what to do. We discuss first.
T6 T: OK. Remember that we are still learning. I want you to get it right. I want you to try
so at least we understand those words. Ok once you understand those words you
would follow the story. Then work out your own short presentation on the word or
phrase I’ve given you.
[Learners discuss the passages in isiXhosa and thereafter make their presentations in
English].
Key: T1, T2,…= Turn 1, Turn2,…; L = Learner; T = Teacher
Observation notes
After introducing the lesson, the teacher meticulously arranges learners into groups.
She seems to be taking her time about it – moving one student to one group, only to
move him or her to another group. The teacher arranges learners into 7 groups of 5 to
discuss a passage from a prepared text. The learners are told to re-interpret the
passage and come with their own narratives focusing on the following terms/phrases:
“courageous”, “mental strength”, “physical strength”, and “ability to endure”. After 5–
8 minute group discussion a member of the group was expected to present to the class
the group’s re-interpretation in a recontextualised narrative. Each of the groups was
allocated one term/phrase to work on and to orally present in English.
Blommaert (2016) has argued that multilinguals’ linguistic skills are not just socially
structured but also that their skills in critical components of language are not evenly
distributed. The teacher deliberately designed the group dynamics to take advantage of the
extended linguistic repertoires and differentiated skills of the learners. By re-arranging the
groups, she re-aligned and undermined the learners’ unevenly distributed linguistic skills.
She effectively integrated the learners linguistic and academic strengths so as to minimise
the weaknesses and as a result to maximise cognitive engagement with content for academic
success. In this regard, each group had a leader who directed the discussion; the discussants
made up of the whole group; the scribes who wrote down the meanings of “difficult” words
and were also responsible for writing down in English the final presentation on their chosen
word/phrase with the help of the group, and lastly, the orator responsible for reading the
presentation of the reworked text to the rest of the class.
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The significance of ensuring that each group had learners with different English
composition/writing and/or spoken skills ensured that each learner had a particular role to
play in the evolving classroom practice. That the teacher allowed the learners to use Xhosa,
English and Xhosa-English blends in the evolving classroom practices, also ensured that
knowledge of monoglot English norms, or lack of it, was not going to stand in the way of
engaging with the content in the text and achieving the goals of the lesson. The teacher re-
arranging learners can be said to be part of Curriculum Initiation which extends and overlaps
with Curriculum Collaboration, in which learners discuss and prepare for the presentation.
As the teacher moves from one group to another, she reinforces the regulative register by
reminding each group what they are supposed to do and focus on. She used translanguaged
Xhosa and English to ensure that the learners understood what was expected. Learners on
their part used mainly Xhosa and English-Xhosa repertoire in their group discussions.
It would seem from turn 1 that the learners are not clear about the teacher’s
instructions. The teacher’s use of the word “share” appears to add to the confusion. The
teacher uses the word twice. The second use should rather have been “present.” The teacher
extends the meaning of the word “share” to incorporate “discussion,” especially in the first
instance. In a way in turn 3, the learner questions the teacher’s use of the word “share”
without appearing to do so. The teacher in turn indirectly accuses the learner of not taking
leadership of the group. Turn 5 shows that the learner already knew what the teacher wanted
the class to do. In the final analysis, even though learner 2 is responding in Xhosa he appears
to have knowledge of English, especially the difference between “sharing” and “discussing,”
and “sharing” and “presenting.” However, with the teacher indirectly threatening to take over
“leadership” of the group, the learner concedes the classroom power play.
The translanguaging practices in-group discussions, constituting the Curriculum
Collaboration (Christie, 2002), brought out translation and interpretation skills in the
learners. This meant that the meanings and understanding of the words and phrases
(terminology) were achieved across linguistic boundaries. Translanguaging as seen above
depicts a “responsive engagement with complex new forms of linguistic, social and racial
diversity” (Stroud & Kerfoot, 2013, p. 2). Allowing learners to draw on their various
experiences and their linguistic repertoire empowers all learners to participate in the
discussions and subsequent production of knowledge. In this regard, inability to speak in
monoglot English or monoglot Xhosa was not a barrier to lively discussions that took place in
the groups. English words and phrases were dissected for meanings while paragraphs were
re-presented in Xhosa or Xhosa-English hybrid forms. In essence, the whole exercise
showcased how learners in multilingual contexts can use new forms of multilingual linguistic
competence in an integrated way to engage with cognitively demanding tasks and to produce
new knowledge in the process.
The next sequence in pedagogic discourse can be said to be overlapping Curriculum
Collaboration (teacher and learners engaging on aspects of presentation) and Curriculum
Closure, in which case the presentation is deemed to be successfully presented, and thus the
goal of the lesson is met (cf. Christie, 1997, 2002).
T7 T: Let’s start with group 4.
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T8 L3 (Group 4): When I was 13 years old my father used to beat my mother every time
when he was drunk. My mother did not go to the police because she loved her
husband. She “endured” in that situation in the name of love.
T9 T: It is clear, right class?
T10 Ls: Yes.
T11 T: Group 2.
T12 L3 (Group 2): I want to say that “endurance” is what makes us human. If yesterday
you “endured,” and tomorrow comes you are fine, you have “endured.” Every day
there are challenges that come, you have to “Endure.”
T13 T: Ok. “Courageous?” Yes, speaker, Group 5.
T14 L4 (Group 5): You may be “courageous” at school or home, or maybe with the project
that you join or perhaps mostly in the community or school work. For example even if
the teacher says to me I am not serious with my books and I am not listening when the
teacher is busy teaching the class; I am Ok because of hope and my confidence. I have
told myself I will pass this grade and I will read my books and I am also going to listen
when the teacher is busy teaching. I have “courage” to say that and believe in my
abilities and myself.
It is interesting to note how learners have weaved their own unique experiences into
the narratives. In Turn 8, for example, the learner uses gender-based violence against women
as backdrop to explaining what enduring means. Women are sometimes known to endure
years of abuse in the name of love. It is also the case that most of such violence is not
reported to the police for fear of further or more serious repercussions from the abuser.
It is also noteworthy that Group 2 has transformed the story into a more or less
philosophical exposition, while Group 5 links “courage” to confidence and abilities. What is
captivating in the study so far is the transformation of texts resulting from discussions done
in Xhosa, English and Xhosa-English linguistic dispensations, which are thereafter reworked
into written “standard” English ready for oral presentation.
The use of translingual discourse does not necessarily mean that the speakers are
completely oblivious to the formal monoglot norms. Indeed, in the classroom interactions
under study, it became apparent that the learners and teacher could carry long stretches of
dialogue in what can be said to be “Standard” English as illustrated below. It is easy to
mistake the initial hesitation by the female learner presenter as indicative of her not having
the vocabulary to express herself. However, the banter that takes place between the learners
and the teacher suggests the interactants are able to carry a reasonable conversation in
English. In terms of levels of formality, turns 15–23 have a more colloquial tone than turns
24–28. What is also interesting in the following pedagogic discourse is the emphasis on
instructional register as the sequence moves from Collaborative to Curriculum Closure
(Christie, 2002).
T15 T: Group 7, physical strength?
T16 L5: There were two students, a girl and boy = = =
T17 T: There were there were…= = =
T18 L5: Ok
12
T19 T: One student but two…one student but two?
[The learner appears unsure about the teacher’s interruption and how to respond to
her.]
T20 T: One student, one cow,…. but two cows. One student but two….
T21 Ls [Shout out]: Students!
T22 L5: There were two students, a girl and a boy. They were arguing about a chair. The
boy was saying it is his chair and the girl was saying the same.
[The class laughs]
T23 T: What happened, because I know I am going to punish some people, now after this,
what happened? [Teacher in jocular voice]
T24 L5: [Continues]…and the girl was saying it was hers; they began to fight and because
the boy is stronger than the girl, the boy won, and that is how they have showed their
differences in physical strength.
T25 T: Right. We said men are stronger physically. [Looking and pointing at some boys]
You have got physical power and we know that you are stronger than me. In the story
she was sharing (referring to the presenter of group 7) you find out the man - the boy
won the fight not because the boy was right; maybe the chair belongs to the girl.
Right?
T26 Ls: Yes
T27 T: So to apply physical strength it does notmean that you are right all the time. It is
just like when you are arguing and you don’t agree about certain point, as you are
arguing you will find out that I have got more points than you. But then after that we
fight and then you win the fight because of your physical strength. It does notmean
you have got facts it only means that you have got physical strength but not facts.
T28 Ls: Yes.
It is noteworthy the kinds of collaborative learning taking place in the above extract.
In turn 21, the other learners help the presenter with logic and meaning making. In turn 22,
the learners’ laughter suggests they are aware of the ambiguity in the line: “The boy was
saying it is his chair and the girl was saying the same.” This also illustrates the danger of
direct translation from Xhosa language. The teacher did not appear to be aware of the
apparent contradiction, or had decided not to point it out, as this would impinge on the
learner’s confidence, and thus affect her presentation. The latter seems to be the case as the
teacher cajoles the learner to continue with the presentation (“What happened.”), and
jokingly suggests she will punish those learners’ trying to distract the presenter. This results
in the learner gaining confidence and continuing with her narrative in more or less
“standard” English. The learners’ responses and teacher monologue are entirely in English in
this stage unlike in the previous stage discussed above, where the learners in particular
blended Xhosa and English.
In the dialogue above, the interaction between the teacher and the learners takes place
entirely in English. Evidently, the learner had difficult instantiating the story in English or
was just shy (turn 16), but with the teacher’s and other learners’ prompting and teasing her
along, she opens up into an English monologue. It is also interesting that the teacher and
learners do not switch to Xhosa, as one would expect, to re-align the topic and their everyday
13
experiences and beliefs. In turns 25 and 27, the teacher uses English to recontextualise the
learners’ cultural knowledge and everyday experiences in which the male is thought to have
more physical strength than the female. In a subtle way, this is also a socio-cultural critique
or commentary by the teacher, in which she highlights how males use their physical strength
to subdue females.
Starting turn 29, in advancing the instructional register, the teacher has to use English
only to avoid a cultural taboo that forbids females discussing what happens at male initiation
schools. From a cultural perspective, the female learner and the female teacher may not talk
about certain issues related to male initiation, as it is in Xhosa culture the prerogative of the
“initiated” (circumcised) males (Funani, 1990; Nkosi, 2005, 2013). This explains why the
discussion is general, and relates to what is already out in the media and communities, and
the teacher is careful to keep it like that, and not to claim she knows the specifics. The girl
who did the presentation on behalf of the group appears to have also been well aware of the
taboo. She started the presentation hesitantly and spoke in a low voice. The teacher is
evidently well aware of the cultural taboo but navigates around it by teasing the boys (“men”)
and joking about her own lack of knowledge about what happens in male initiation schools.
The teacher diffuses the tension and the female presenter’s nervousness by humorously
pointing at her own lack of knowledge in matters of male initiation, which involves
circumcision. In multilingual contexts, the different linguistic choices carry different taboos
and licences (Banda, 2005). In multilingual Africa, it is more palatable to use English in
discussing genitalia than African languages, in which case it comes out as gross, insulting
and disrespectful; and insults are less venomous in English than in African languages
(Banda, 2005). During her study on gender and Xhosa male circumcision, Nkosi (2005)
found that she was often denied access to information relating to the ritualised language and
other specifics because as a woman she was an outsider. She notes that “One respondent
thumped his fists on the table and shouted at me, stating that I should get a Xhosa
circumcised male to conduct interviews on my behalf” (Nkosi, 2005, p. 29). In another
incident, a man only agreed to be interviewed about Xhosa circumcision if the interviews
were conducted in English, as “sex language” is “strong” and awkward when discussed in an
African language (Nkosi, 2005, p. 26).
In the pedagogic discourse below, the use of English by the teacher enables her to
avoid an awkward and embarrassing situation – a situation which she in turn uses to
engender the instruction register whose goal is conducting a successful English oral
presentation.
Group 1’s presentation could not be clearly recorded as the female presenter was
obviously uncomfortable with the topic and other learners (both male and female) sniggered
and laughed at her discomfort during the presentation. In Xhosa culture, females and
uncircumcised “boys” are not expected to discuss male circumcision and the rituals
surrounding it. The teacher, on the other hand, took the opportunity offered by the topic to
distinguish between the mental endurance of pain males undergo during circumcision, and
physical strength. The linguistic choice of English is significant as it enables her to get away
with a social taboo. The topic is “de-culturalised” as it becomes part of teaching and learning
English a “foreign” language. This would be seen as transgression of cultural norms if Xhosa,
a language associated with Xhosa culture, had been used. The female teacher appears to
14
enjoy the licence offered by English and even pretended not to know what happens during
the process of circumcision.
T29 T [to female presenter]: Your group is assisting you; [focuses on the boys] so now I am
listening from them. Ok, I cannot comment on that (circumcision) but I wanted you to
make examples. Do you hear?
T30 L6: Yes.
T31 T: They are talking about circumcision, ok? So I cannot also relate to that because I
was never there and I will never be there.
[Entire class laughs]
But it is a pity that I do not know what happens exactly [during circumcision], but I
think there is something that is done to your body and you need to be strong ok?
[Nervous laughter and giggles from learners]. Your example is very close to the point
but it is not exactly the meaning of physical strength. If I have got physical strength I
can deal with people against me I can push them because I am strong physically, so
that is the meaning of physical strength. But now being in the pain, I am not quite
sure it means physical strength. What do you think?
T32 Ls [Group 1]: To endure.
T33 T: Yes, it is endurance, it is endurance that you have shared but not physical strength.
Ok when you look at wrestlers, wrestlers have got physical strength, ne, pulling down
the table and the showing of physique. I am using physical strength. But what you
have shared is endurance, because it has got something with overcoming pain. But at
least you have tried.
The female teacher in “solidarity” comes to the rescue of the female learner who is
coaxed by male members to present on what is culturally taboo. Solidarity with the female
learner is seen in the line “I cannot also relate to that…” At the same time she seems to blame
the males in the group rather than the female member for giving an incorrect answer. The
line “Your group is assisting you” is thus ironic, as the group has not assisted the female
learner. They have selected an illustration using a topic females are not supposed to partake
in. Instead of dropping the topic, the female teacher whimsically pretends she does not know
anything about what happens during the initiation rites; at the same time, she uses available
cultural knowledge to make clear the subtle difference between mental endurance and
physical strength. Group 1 had confused endurance of pain that “boys” need to undergo to
become “men” with physical strength. Thus, the teacher seizes the opportunity offered by the
taboo topic to teach English concepts, mental endurance and physical strength. The teacher
using English during the discussion of the topic of circumcision also helps her avoid words
and phrases that would sound offensive and inappropriate if Xhosa was used. The use of
irony and humour by the teacher also helps her to defy social roles but at the same time not
to appear culturally offensive (cf. Banda, 2005).
It can be said, therefore, that translanguaging is not merely about language mixing
and using of bit-and-pieces of language, it is also about infusing local knowledge systems and
cultures in pursuit of excellence in teaching and learning in multilingual contexts. Rather
than showing linguistic deficit, translanguaging as illustrated above engenders ease of topic
15
delivery and consumption of content, which would otherwise be decontextualised and
tedious if a monolingual approach was used. It is evident from the illustrations above that
these learners and their teacher are capable of using either English or Xhosa only, but they
seem more at home when the formal boundaries between languages are ignored. They are at
home using lexemes and morphemes or whole chunks from the two or more languages as
belonging to a linguistic repertoire or language practice
(García & Wei, 2014). Translanguaging allows learners and teachers alike to use words and
phrases already familiar, and teachers to strategically tap into the learners’ own life
experiences, and home literacies and thus bringing the home knowledge into the classroom
interaction (Canagarajah, 2001, 2011; García, 2014; García & Wei, 2014).
The classroom practice described in this article illustrates the kinds of classroom
practices in other township schools in multilingual contexts of South Africa (see, for
example, Banda, 2010; Makalela, 2015a, 2015b; Paxton, 2009; Setati, 1998; Setati & Adler,
2000; Setati et al., 2002). Teachers that allow learners’ bilingual repertoire to be used in
translanguaging style do it despite the language education policy in place. This observation
was collaborated by teachers interviewed at the school and the principal. One teacher had
this to say about the official language policy and the actual classroom practice.
Teacher: The medium of instruction here at X High School is English. But we are
obliged to use isiXhosa because they [learners] do not only understand
English.
This teacher is aware that the learners are familiar with both English and Xhosa (with
varying degrees of proficiency in each). He added that teachers at the school use both
languages at the same time for convenience, as this is also what the learners are used to
in their daily lives. The school principal echoed this sentiment and added that using a
combination of the two languages has led to pedagogical success.
Principal: The language policy is that the language of instruction obviously has
been English, obviously, but obviously English and Xhosa, because we
code switch here, we use both of them. It has been like that and it’s still
like that. We use English as a medium of instruction and Xhosa. It is a
successful combination because when child thinks, he/ she thinks in
Xhosa even if you dream in Xhosa.
Although the language education policy is that schools should use English as medium
of instruction, issues related to proficiency in the target language as well as the multilingual
context dictate that schools use both English and Xhosa. Classroom translanguaging is thus
the inevitable consequence of the community language practices and learners’ extended
linguistic repertoire finding focus in pedagogical discourse.
16
Translanguaging as linguistic dispensation in pedagogic discourse
The regulative register dominates turns 1–6 and group discussions among learners.
Translanguaging appears to be at its most intensity at this time in the sequence, which also
appears to coincide with the Curriculum Initiation and overlapping with the Curriculum
Collaboration stage. The use of English in more or less monoglot fashion is mostly found in
instructional register, starting turn 8. This stage appears to lead from the Curriculum
Collaboration to Curriculum Closure with the learners giving presentations and the teacher
interventions by prompting for clarification and making “corrections” to the presentations
before validating them. The overlapping second and third stages are done in monolingual
English as a way to validate the goal of the lesson, that is, to enable learners do an English
presentation on given topics. Since English is the target language, it is not surprising that the
instructional register dominates these two stages. Overall, the sequenced selection of
languages and linguistic forms in Xhosa and English appear designed to cater for the fact
that the examinations are done in English.
In its original conceptualisation, Christie’s (1997) pedagogical macrogenres model
works with a single language in English dominant contexts. Additionally, in monolingual
pedagogic discourse actualisation of regulative and instructional registers is limited to a
single language, for instance, English only. This does not have to be the case in multilingual
contexts, where learners and teachers have the opportunity to deploy the extended linguistic
repertoire in pedagogical discourse. For learners whose competence in English is weaker
than their first language and where translanguaging is not allowed, learners might not
demonstrate the knowledge and associated skills being taught just because the language used
to regulate the discourse was not clear enough as to what was expected of them. I, however,
posit that Christie’s pedagogical macrogenres model offers the tools to analyse pedagogic
discourse in which two or more languages are used as media of instruction in a predictable
manner especially in contexts where the learners have not yet acquired proficiency in the
target language. Thus, the learners’ stronger language, in this case Xhosa and/ or
translanguaged Xhosa/English forms, can be used to guide, pace and direct their behaviour
while they target English language but their weaker language is used for practicing “content”
until the learners have acquired sufficient proficiency in it, or in readiness for government
examinations, which are in English.
I have shown that curriculum macrogenres (Christie, 2001, 2002, 2005), most
notably, Curriculum Initiation “the beginning,” Curriculum Collaboration “the middle,” and
Curriculum Closure “the end” pattern unfolded through various shifts and choices in
languages. In the multilingual contexts, illustrated in this article, these shifts occur
between/across two or more languages (rather than a shift in register in the same language
as indicated in Christie’s studies). In terms of classroom interaction, developments within
and between the stages are a function of negotiations between the learners and the teacher
using two or more languages as linguistic resources.
I have also shown that the teacher used the regulative register to guide and direct the
behaviour of the learners. Translanguaging, especially among the pedagogic subjects, was at
its highest as the learners are being primed for the task ahead and as they, in turn, sought
clarification about the task at hand and how to accomplish it. As Christie notes, the functions
17
of regulative register “will have been achieved, when at the end of a curriculum macrogenre,
the subjects are enabled to do certain new things, where these are realised in instructional
register choices” (Christie, 1997, p. 136). Besides, Christie suggests that where the language
of the regulative register is focused, the directions towards the tasks the learners are to
achieve will be correspondingly clear as learners receive unambiguous information about the
steps to take to achieve those goals. Using an extended linguistic repertoire was critical in
regulating and giving learners unambiguous information on the task at hand. This study
showed how the teacher paced and directed the learners as they learnt how to go about their
tasks while, where required, they sought clarification (the regulative register). At the same
time, learners were being guided towards the “content,” or information they are to use in
order to complete their tasks (the instructional register). It is the case that unlike in
monolingual contexts, curriculum macrogenres and both registers are available to the
learners under study in two languages, English and Xhosa. By allowing translanguaging, the
teacher in the current study provided the learners access to knowledge through open choices,
opportunities and options in the different languages. In essence, Christie’s formulation of
instructive and regulative registers is made practicable through translanguaging, that is,
strategic alternative use of Xhosa and English in the teaching–learning process.
Summary and conclusion
By using the extended linguistic repertoire, the learners and the teacher have come up with a
new classroom discourse quite unlike one you would find in monolingual educational
contexts. Note that the group discussion in Xhosa, English and hybrid language ensures that
all learners participate in finding the solution to the task at hand, hence promoting
collaborative learning. In communities where there are diminished chances of acquiring
English naturally, this also provides peer-learning opportunity as the less proficient in
English learn from the more proficient learners. In this regard, translanguaging reformulates
the classroom as a space that enables agency through allowance of “multiplicity of voices
(stances, perspectives, social lives)” (Heller, 2007, p. 8), which would otherwise remain
unheard if strictly monolingual English classroom practices were allowed.
Translanguaged discourses provided the means through which learners consumed
and produced cognitively demanding concepts without worrying about conforming to
monoglot standard Xhosa or standard English. In that sense, it provided the transition and
the scaffolding in which technical terms and concepts were framed to enable ease of recall,
cognitive processing and access. As Baker observes:
To read and discuss a topic in one language, and then to write about it in another
language, means that the subject matter has to be processed and “digested.” (Baker,
2011, p. 289)
In other words, the learners not only translated, they also reinterpreted knowledge
across linguistic and cultural contexts. Translanguaging enabled the learners to unlock
knowledge embedded in different linguistic and cultural-semiotic features embedded in their
linguistic and related socio-semiotic repertoire.
18
Language policies need to consider the fact that the multilingual linguistic
dispensation in Africa and elsewhere has enabled affordances of the complex linguistic and
non-linguistic repertoires that could engender teaching and learning. As shown in this study,
this multilingual linguistic dispensation (Aronin & Singleton, 2008) opens up new avenues
of language use and learning, and engagement with cognitively demanding academic tasks.
The linguistic repertoire can be used to access, produce and consume knowledge. There is
need to explore “how these repertoires can be harnessed for transformative curriculum
change in the teaching of disciplines” (Stroud & Kerfoot, 2013, p. 2). I am in agreement with
Stroud and Kerfoot (2013, p. 2), who suggest a language policy development process that
moves from micro-interaction to macro-structure and interrogation of what is currently seen
as “legitimate” representational resources and conventions. This means questioning
monoglot/monolingual formalised practices as a way to restructure institutional practices
and policies that have informed language education models in multilingual Africa.
The current language education policy is at odds with the multilingual language
practices in place as it is based on notions of linguistics of difference (García, 2007).
Regardless of whether the language of education is the “mother tongue” (Xhosa) or English,
the policy limits learners’ access to the extended linguistic repertoires that would enable
them achieve power, voice and agency (Banda, 2010; Blackledge & Creese, 2010; Stroud &
Kerfoot, 2013). A comprehensive language in education policy needs to see the learners’
linguistic repertoires as material affordance in the promotion and pursuance of learning.
Voice and not linguistic difference should be the starting point for pedagogical intercourse.
This, according to Stroud and Kerfoot (2013), entails shifting focus from languages to
linguistic repertoires, proficiency to practices and from code-switching to translanguaging.
In this way, learners become agents of their own education, creators of knowledge and
innovators of their own destinies. Translanguaging as classroom practice becomes
transformative in that it mitigates if not levels the hegemonic effects of the social structuring
of languages (Banda, 2010), and hence becomes a tool of social justice for marginalised
African languages (cf. García & Leiva, 2014). This necessitates a drastic change in language
education policy and classroom practice that places translanguaging at the centre of
education. Otherwise, African languages will continue to be at the margins of classroom
practice in Africa, with few learners able to fully participate in English
monoglot/monolingual classroom practices.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes on contributor
Felix Banda, Ph.D., is a senior professor in the Department of Linguistics at the University of
Western Cape, South Africa. He teaches undergraduate and postgraduate courses in
language and multilingualism in society and education, critical media and technology-
mediated business/organisational communication and intercultural communication. His
research interests are located at the intersection of language as social practice,
19
multicultural/multilingual material culture and the discursive construction of identities in
society and education; linguistic landscapes, semiotic remediation and the multimodal
corporate identities, branding and advertising, youth and hip hop cultures, language
planning and policy and multimodal critical pedagogies and the educational implications of
the syntactic and morphophonological similarities of Bantu languages for transnational/Pan
African orthography design and reform.
20
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